Here rose
In memory still, though I a child departed,
These natal walls, and the just Heaven in time
Leads me back hither.
Twice five years have passed
This very day since that dread night of blood,
When, slain by treachery, my father made
The whole wide palace with his dolorous cries
Echo again. Oh, well do I remember!
Electra swiftly bore me through this hall
Thither where Strophius in his pitying arms
Received me--Strophius, less by far thy father
Than mine, thereafter--and fled onward with me
By yonder postern-gate, all tremulous;
And after me there ran upon the air
Long a wild clamor and a lamentation
That made me weep and shudder and lament,
I knew not why, and weeping Strophius ran,
Preventing with his hand my outcries shrill,
Clasping me close, and sprinkling all my face
With bitter tears; and to the lonely coast,
Where only now we landed, with his charge
He came apace; and eagerly unfurled
His sails before the wind.
Pylades strives to restrain the passion for revenge in Orestes,
which imperils them both. The friend proposes that they shall feign
themselves messengers sent by Strophius with tidings of Orestes'
death, and Orestes has reluctantly consented, when Electra re-appears,
and they recognize each other.
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